POLITICO ebook: Plenty of 2012 pitfalls for Obama and Romney

President Barack Obama’s stunningly bad performance at the first debate was no surprise to his closest advisers — Obama had stormed out of a debate prep session just days before the disaster in Denver.

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Obama's victory speech

Romney's concession

Before he flopped, Obama’s team pressured their distracted boss to take Mitt Romney more seriously and bear down during debate practice — and he shot back, accusing them of sending him into battle with a mushy, ill-defined plan of attack.

“This is all great,” he told the team during one of 11 prep sessions he attended, most of them at Democratic National Committee headquarters in Washington. “But what am I actually supposed to do when I get onto the stage? You are telling me what not to do. I feel like I’m getting a lot of contradictory advice, guys.”

If Obama’s crisis of confidence flared at a particularly inopportune time, the never fully resolved problem of how to present Romney to the public was foreshadowed in a dispute between the Republican’s family and his advisers two years before the campaign even began.

A behind-the-scenes documentary on Romney from the 2008 campaign made by a filmmaker friend of the candidate’s sons aimed to show the warm and decent man behind the awkward politician prone to reinforcing his own rich-guy caricature. But the film was spiked by the advisers and has never aired. The problem, in the eyes of the candidate’s high command: The film was too heavy on Romney’s Mormonism.

Campaign 2012 played against type.

Romney, the self-professed master manager, the man who wanted to be the CEO of the USA, couldn’t even manage his own delusional campaign or find a formula to sell his own brand.

Obama, presumed to be the greatest political performer of his generation, couldn’t — or simply wouldn’t — perform at one of the most crucial moments of the campaign to the bafflement and frustration of his own staff, who were left to try to buck up a dispirited president in the wake of the first debate catastrophe.

These are the conclusions of “The End of the Line,” an eBook out Monday published in collaboration between POLITICO and Random House and based on more than three dozen interviews with central players on both campaigns.

If the 2012 campaign started off as a slog, the Oct. 3 Denver debate momentarily transformed the race into a real contest, one that pivoted on a surprising paradox that upended pre-election conventional wisdom.

The electoral machine that produced a president this year, the billion-dollar startup that functioned with the greatest corporate efficiency, was an Obama campaign based in Chicago and rooted in the streamlined ethos of Silicon Valley, not the Boston-based corporate takeover team run by Romney like a family business.

Obama’s 332-electoral vote victory vindicated his strategy to define Romney early. But there was plenty of drama behind his campaign’s no-drama façade, particularly after Denver.

Romney’s campaign, scrambling to catch up after a protracted GOP primary, was not only outclassed by the incumbent, but held too long to the mistaken assumption that the election amounted to a referendum on Obama’s economic policies. By the time the candidate and his top adviser, Stuart Stevens, realized a message of “Obama isn’t working” was insufficient, it was after Labor Day and too late. By then — never having made his own case in a sustained and effective way and giving Obama fodder at a crucial moment — Romney had been defined as a cartoonishly out-of-touch fat cat.

Money was moving from the Romney campaign over to the Senate races. Obama took a dive in the first debate, and the money flooded back. The Dems ended up keeping the White House and expanding their majority in the Senate. It was one of the greatest political maneuvers of our time.

1. He decided to go negative during the GOP primaries. Per ABC Romney spent close to 100 million dollars running negative attack ads against what was a relitive weak field. All of his oppenents couldn't, didn't have that type of money or organizations to counter act him. Over kill comes to mind. This portrayed Romney as being a mean man. Throw in Obama's ads defining him in the swing states and this perception was re-inforced.

2. Romney never ran any positive ads, introducing him and his familty to the American electorate choosing to continue with negative attack ads, this time towards Obama. Thus totally re-inforcing the perception of him being a mean man. See number 1

3. His whole campaign was based on the fact he wasn't Obama. He had no vision for the next 4 years. He gave voters no reason to vote for him. Whereas Obama favorable/unfavorable ratings averaged 10 points above his unfavorable numbers. Romney was never able to get his favorable rating above his unfavorable rating number. Possibly because he stayed negative all the time and never ran a positive ad.

Romney's weak, defensive, and timid approach in the 2nd and 3rd debates are the main reason we are cursed with the serial prevaricator for a second term. Obama lies almost every time he opens his infected sewer.

Who do I blame for this disaster, other than the short-sighted fools who voted for him? The RINO establishment in the GOP who gave us Mitt Romney, just another politically weak moderate GOP candidate.. The election BELONGED to Romney after the first head-to-head debate, and he gave it away in the next two by playing it safe and being WEAK!

Money was moving from the Romney campaign over to the Senate races. Obama took a dive in the first debate, and the money flooded back. The Dems ended up keeping the White House and expanding their majority in the Senate. It was one of the greatest political maneuvers of our time.

Let's put it this way, Romney lost because he wasn't the right candidate to beat a very vulunerable president. The Republicans lost in the senate because they chose candidates that the voters couldn't identify with and in some instances repelled independent voters which the GOP needed to get them over the hump. The Republicans did the samething in 2010 in places like Deleware and Nevada, this time in Missour, Indiana and then chose candidates in Montana and North Dakota that the people of those states just didn't like.

Unless the Republicans start picking better candidates at all levels, they are not going to win these elections.

Let's put it this way, Romney lost because he wasn't the right candidate to beat a very vulunerable president.

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Correct. Then again, I said that during the primaries about two or three HUNDRED times. Mitt Romney is one hell of a man; an extraordinary American!! Unfortunately for American voters, they don't always choose the better man, they choose the better politician sometimes.

Romney is a man (politically speaking) who's custom made to make the conservative base sit home on election day.

I knew that, and I warned about it until I was blue in the face during the primaries.

Correct. Then again, I said that during the primaries about two or three HUNDRED times. Mitt Romney is one hell of a man; an extraordinary American!! Unfortunately for American voters, they don't always choose the better man, they choose the better politician sometimes.

When picking a candiate for president regardless of party, one must choose one that can obtained more than 90% of those who identify with their party, then one who can win over independent/swing voters. Once the primaries are over, a candidate must have enough assurance in his base that they will turn out and vote for him without having to continuing to campaign for their vote. This way whichever candidate can concentrate on the indies. Romney never really made a serious pitch for the swing voters.

I do not know about the rest of the nation, but here in Georgia, there was no enthusiam for Romney. No enthusiam to go voter FOR Romeny. The enthusiam was voting against Obama. Over half of the votes Romeny received were votes against Obama, not votes for Romney, the name atop the Republican ticket didn't matter, any Tom, DIck or Harry would have done.

Ironically, you leftists are SO far gone that you've missed the forest for the trees. Rove is one of those moderates who's MORE than happy to meet you leftists halfway.

YOU are on the Totalitarian left, I'm on the right end of the spectrum as a conservative libertarian. I'd reduce Washington by 2/3 if it were my call, and return 90% of governing to the state and local level.

Karl Rove is dead smack in the middle between us, and neither one of us like him! We dislike him for different reasons. I view him as an unprincipled political opportunist. YOU dislike him because he was an integral part of the team that kept Democrats out of the White House for 8 years.

Your post SHOULD be a cautionary tale for Republicans...but they won't understand why.

I disagree entirely! The last 4 weeks of his campaign were WEAK, and they were an attempt to go after the indies and the STUPID vote. I watched it happen in real time, and I also watched the open conservative revolt on various blogsites. I could give you one example after another after another of his outreach to the "indies" (idiot voters).

That's when he lost what was left of the base. He turned out fewer than McCain...unreal.

That's when he lost what was left of the base. He turned out fewer than McCain...unreal.

I got to go, one of the big differences though McCain was beaten more badly was McCain votes were for him vs. Romney's votes against his opponent. In 2008 the electorate were just tired of the Republicans and wanted someone else. In 2012 I think most people were leery of both candidates. In the end I think it was the trust factor, people just trusted Obama a little more than Romney. The best politician, yes the best politician won. The final choice for most independents view Obama as the least worst candidate of the two. Take care and perhaps I shall return tonight.

Rove is one of those moderates who's MORE than happy to meet you leftists halfway.

loretta: Dec. 17, 2012 - 7:22 AM EST

You seem to be having a synapse problem. Someone else must be using the shared GOP brain this morning.

In fairness to Jingoist, Loretta, one has to keep in mind that, for conservatives, meeting half way means giving them 100% of what they want. 50% would make the Republican a RINO and the Democrat one who refuses to compromise, or "meet us half way".